by SR Jones
The others have all come out of the back of the house at various points, and unless there are other men in there, who haven’t made an appearance and who Gezim knows nothing about, I believe there are only four targets.
Four targets and one young woman who can become collateral damage if I fuck this up.
I won’t fuck it up.
I’ve done this dance before and with far better trained opponents. These guys are drinking, smoking, and generally acting like the street level gangster wannabes they are.
My phone screen lights up.
Go.
My heart rate kicks up, and I grin. I can’t help it if I love the action.
Wearing camo paint, fatigues, and with my HK416 across my shoulder, I head across the land toward the cliffs to my right. There’s an entry point to the ocean down a steep path on one of the cliffs. I put my phone into a waterproof bag strapped to my side. Check my thigh for my Navy knife, and then the other thigh for my Gluca B1, a knife that also has fancy additions to break glass and cut off wrist restraints. You never know what you might need at some point.
It’s only a short swim across to the dock of the house where they’re holding Gezim’s daughter, but the currents can be tricky here, so I’m keeping my wits about me.
Once down the steep track leading to the tiny patch of rock-strewn beach, I take a moment to eye the water. It’s not calm, but it’s not crazy either. There’s a strong wind, and it looks like the current is pulling out to the open sea, which means I’ll be swimming against it. It will be strenuous but short.
I slide into the water, and swim out a little way, wanting to clear the rocks, before turning right and heading around the rocky headland toward the house they’ve rented.
There are lights surrounding the dock, and they act like a beacon. I don’t need my night-vision goggles or any of that shit because these fools have lit the way for me.
The kid on the deck is pacing up and down, and like the utter amateur he is, the fucker isn’t facing the water as I swim up, silent and deadly.
He’s looking up at the house, and a scream sounds from the upstairs bedroom.
Fuck.
Seems like I’m right on time. These guys must be panicking. They won’t have heard from Janusz, but they don’t know he’s dead either. The moment I have taken these fuckers out, and have Roze to safety, the plan is that Gezim will let it be known that Jan is gone, and he’ll execute a takeover of the whole damn rotten edifice. At that point, it’s of no interest to me. My job is to keep Roze safe until he’s in charge and any further threat is neutralized.
The kid on the dock messes around in his pocket and takes out a pack of smokes. His back to me, he taps one out as I pull myself onto the deck. I have my knife out of my holster and my arm raised before he stiffens in the way people do when they become aware of something.
Either he heard me, or his sixth sense kicked in. Either way, he’s dead.
I wrap one gloved hand around his mouth and raise my other to cut his throat.
A soft gurgle is the only sound he makes. Gently, I lower him to the deck, not wanting to make a sound. I drag him out of the way and take his gun. I walk to the edge of the dock and drop it into the water.
Music starts from inside the house. It’s something with a pulsing beat and a woman rapping over it in a language I don’t recognize.
Creeping up to the open sliding doors, I stay out of sight as I try to get a look inside. One of them is probably upstairs in that bedroom where Roze screamed, maybe even two.
There’s a thud from the same room, loud enough for me to hear it over the pounding beat. What the hell are they doing to her?
Not wanting to use my rifle, I reach into my waterproof bag and take out my Sig with the suppressor attached. Sliding into the room, I clear the living space. The music is blaring out, but there’s no one in here. Sticking to the wall, I peer around into the kitchen space and spot two men pouring drinks from a bottle of vodka.
These guys are so fucking dumb. I raise my weapon and aim, hitting the first one, a tall blond, right between the eyes. The second guy hits the ground with faster reflexes than I would’ve credited him with.
If he fires back, the fucker upstairs, who must be Francis as he’s the one with the red hair, and there’s no redheads down here, will hear.
I drop to the ground and see the goon under the kitchen table, pulling a gun out of the waistband of his pants.
I aim, fire, breathe, aim, and fire. Two shots to his mid-torso, and he grunts in pain. I aim again the moment he looks at me, and fire. Right between the eyes. His head snaps back as blood blooms.
Done and done, I think as I stand and head for the stairs. I make it quiet, not wanting to alert the fucker who is in the bedroom with Roze.
The door is open, and if it hadn’t been for the pounding rap downstairs, then Francis up here would have heard everything.
I reach the door and glance inside.
Roze is on the bed, and what looks like a long t-shirt is raised up above her bare belly. She’s still wearing her panties, thank fuck. I check out her arms. Zip tied above her head. Her ankles are bound by a rope.
Francis pushes her legs apart roughly, making her knees bend as her feet are tied together.
“I’m going to fucking destroy your precious hole, you fucking cunt.” He spits as he speaks, specks flying everywhere, and I smile to myself.
I’ll actively enjoy this one.
Chapter 3
He’s going to rape me.
I’ve never had sex before, but I’m not naïve or stupid. I know it will hurt a lot if he forces me. The thought of him inside me makes me want to vomit. I won’t let him. I’ll fight him so hard he’ll have to kill me to do it.
Movement out of the corner of my eye catches my attention.
I glance at the door. There’s a man. He’s wearing camo paint, he’s wet, and he’s huge. Massive.
He puts a finger to his lips, and I almost nod, only catching myself at the last moment.
Is he here for me? He must be. Surely.
Hope blooms where before there was nothing but rage and fear. I don’t want to give him away, so I force my gaze to move from the beautiful salvation standing in the doorway, and I focus on Red.
I need to distract him.
“I’ll kill you before I let you touch me,” I tell him with real hatred and anger. I’d have said the same if a six-and-half-foot, camo-covered apparition hadn’t appeared in the doorway.
I pause for a moment.
What if he is an apparition? Like an oasis in a desert that turns out to be nothing more than dry sand when you reach it?
Shit. What if he’s not real?
I won’t look again, though, to reassure myself because that would put him in danger. It would give Red a heads-up.
Instead, I smirk at Red and then, to throw him completely off track, I lick my lips.
“What the fuck are you doing?” he snarls. “Playing games, huh? Fucking slut. Your father thinks he’s the big man; well, how big is he going to be when he gets his daughter back, and she’s all used up and worn out, huh?”
“My father will kill you for this,” I say. It’s true. If the camo apparition weren’t moving toward Red in my peripheral vision, I would’ve died happy in the knowledge that my father would never let this go. He’d hunt these men to the ends of the Earth.
“Your father does this himself. Only he is worse,” Red says.
“You’re a liar,” I say. I know my father isn’t an angel, and I know he’s into crime, but not stuff like this. My father isn’t a rapist. I know because he stopped a girl getting raped in Kosovo and risked his life in doing so. My father is a hero in our old town.
“Okay, maybe, but in our business, do you think the whores want to do it? There aren’t enough naïve, innocent young girls wanting to go into whoring these days.” He licks my throat and chuckles. “We offer them jobs as nannies or models or waitresses, but that’s not what they end up doing. Your dearest daddy
does that too.”
A violent surge of sickness roils in my gut. He’s lying. He must be. My father wouldn’t do that, surely?
“Aw, have I hurt your feelings, little girl?” He laughs. “You’re going to hurt in other ways in about—”
A massive hand covers his mouth, jerks him back hard, yanking him off me and the bed, and then the camo-apparition slices a massive blade into Red’s gut in sharp jabs.
Bright red blood spurts, and covers me in a horrifying arc.
It’s as if a damn breaks, and all my control, all the bravery I thought I had simply collapses. I scream. And I scream. I try to stop, but the sound is still coming; only now it’s more like a wail.
The soldier in front of me wipes the blade of the knife on his camos and shoves it into a holster strapped around his tree trunk-like thigh.
“Hey,” Camo says. Strong fingers take hold of my chin, and he tips my face up. “Roze,” he says, pronouncing my name properly. “Your father sent me for you. We need to leave. Now. You need to focus, okay?”
I nod, but I’m covered in blood, and I can’t bear it. My hands reach for my face, but they’re tied. I want to wipe the filth dripping down my cheeks. It smells. I didn’t know blood smelt so strongly.
“Don’t move,” Camo orders.
I can’t move. I’m tied up still, ankles bound together by rope, and wrists by a zip tie.
Camo stalks out of the room, and I panic. I can’t be alone. I need him. He’s the one saving me. Where did he go? Has he left me because I lost it? Oh, God.
A moment later, he’s back and holding a wet towel. “Here,” he says as he tips my face up, more gently this time. He uses the towel to wipe the blood from my face and neck.
“You’re safe now, okay?” he says. Taking another knife from a different holster, he cuts the rope at my ankles and then uses another part of the weapon to cut the zip ties. “You good?”
I nod, but my teeth are chattering.
“You’re in shock, but I don’t have time to baby you right now. I need you to dig deep and find your strength. Once we get to the safe house, you can go to pieces, but not yet.”
His voice is deep, commanding, but also reassuring. There’s a lilt to what he says, an accent that takes hard words and a deep voice and somehow softens it all. His hair is long, I realize when he bends his head and digs into a bag at his waist, but he has it pulled back into a tight bun behind his head. What sort of soldier has long hair?
He has silver rings on his fingers too; I note as he takes out a phone and jabs at the screen.
“Reece? Yeah, Priest. It’s clear here. Can you remote access the alarm systems and turn the fences off? If not, we’re swimming out, and I have a client who is in shock. Don’t want her in the cold water.”
He listens, nods, then hangs up. No goodbye, or thank you, or ordinary polite conversation.
“Are you a s-s-soldier?” I ask through still chattering teeth.
“Sailor, ma’am,” he answers. “Now, I’m working for a group hired by your father.”
Military, though, at one point. American military more to the point, if his accent is anything to go by, which makes me feel safe. Not all military were our friends during my childhood.
“Come on.” He takes my arm, holding me gently by the elbow.
For such a big man, he has a gentle touch. It soothes me some more. “Did my father send you?”
“Yes, he did.”
“Are you taking me to him?” I don’t think I’ll be safe going to my father, but I also won’t feel safe at home right now.
“Not right away. I’m taking you to an undisclosed location until we can determine the threat is completely neutralized.”
“Who will guard me there?” I ask.
He turns to me and frowns. “I will.”
“Only you?”
“Unless we need back up, yes, just me.”
“Okay.”
He’s clearly good at what he does, so I accept his answer. As we head down the stairs, I see just how good in the shape of more bodies, but one man doesn’t seem like much protection from the Polish mob.
We reach the door, and he waits. “What are we waiting for?” I ask, trying hard not to look in the kitchen at the dead bodies on the floor.
“Code,” he says.
His phone rings, and he answers immediately. “Report?”
He nods. “Good. Thanks.” Camo hangs up, turns to me, and fixes me with a serious stare. “Do you have anything with you? Did they let you bring anything? Or were you barefoot and in your nightdress?”
“I have some running shoes somewhere. They put them on me at my apartment, but they took them off me when we arrived.” I have the t-shirt and shorts too, but the shorts are a lot shorter than my nightdress, and colder.
He nods. “Wait here.”
Then he starts to search the house. A few minutes later, he comes back to me, holding my shoes. “These them?”
I nod and take them from him, bending to fasten them as he speaks again.
“We have the code, which will neutralize the fence. It means we don’t have to swim, but we do have to make it over land, about two miles. You up to it?”
“Yes, I run regularly.” I shrug as I stand straight once more, shoes on. In fact, I think, maybe a run will make me feel better. I’m shaky, but it’s probably adrenaline making me feel this way. A run would burn it off.
“Good.”
He enters numbers into the keypad, and the light turns green.
“Let’s go.”
He stashes his phone in his bag, hoists his rifle, and aims. “Stay behind me,” he orders as he heads out of the door.
I do as he says, crouching low and staying in the safety of his shadow. We reach the fence and the gate, and he kicks it with his boot. No zap of electricity. He touches it with the fingers of one hand, and then he opens the huge metal gate, swinging it outward and walking through, gun raised once more.
Following him, I try to will my heart rate to slow. It’s going so fast that I’ll probably collapse if I try to run unless I calm down.
He heads toward the forest, and once we reach the cover of trees, he slings his gun over his shoulder. Hand rested on a holster at his hip, which I realize holds another gun, he gives me a once over. It’s totally cold and professional. He’s checking me out to make sure I’m not hurt or about to lose it again.
“I’m okay,” I tell him.
In this dark light with the bright floodlights of the house casting strange shadows through the trees, he looks almost monstrous. Severe, with his heavy brow and strong jaw covered in a short beard. He’s my monster, though, I think to myself. My protector.
“You capable of a slow run?” he asks.
“Absolutely,” I reply. I don’t know if I am, but no way am I staying here.
“Okay, follow me.”
He sets off through the woods, and despite the dark, he seems completely at ease with the ground underfoot. I take care to keep directly behind him in his path so that my feet hit where his do. Less chance of me falling that way.
Smooth, steady, and relentless, he jogs in front of me, and I follow.
At first, it’s hard going. My legs are shaky and weak. But as I keep running, something happens. My heart rate steadies. It’s still going fast, but it isn’t skipping beats all the time. My breath becomes rapid but more even.
I know what’s happening. I’m burning off the adrenaline. Fight or flight.
Soon, I’m in a rhythm and feeling as if I could go forever.
After what seems like ages, but is probably only around thirty minutes, we reach a clearing. There’s a large SUV parked with dark windows. Camo stops, rummages in that bag again, and pulls out a key fob. He isn’t even breathing heavily.
Clicking the fob, he opens the passenger door for me. “Get in,” he orders.
I do as he says.
He shuts the door, jogs around to his side, and climbs in.
“So where are you taking
me, Camo?” I ask as he starts the engine.
“Camo?” He spares me a glance.
“I don’t know your name,” I point out.
“Priest. Everyone calls me Priest.”
Okaaaay. It doesn’t seem a suitable moniker for a long-haired, six-and-half-foot biker dude, ex- sailor, but if he says so.
“Where are you taking me, Priest?”
“A safe house we have waiting. No trail to me or you. None to your father either.”
At the mention of my father, my stomach roils again. What Red said about him can’t be true. Can it? I try not to think about it, but the thought won’t go away. The more the thought worms its way into my brain, the sicker I feel.
“I’m going to be sick,” I warn.
Priest yanks the wheel to one side, slams the brakes on, shoots his long arm out past me, and pushes open my door. Just in time. I lean out and throw up nothing but water and bile. Oh God. I hate being sick. To the point I’m practically phobic about it. I don’t really drink because I once got sick on cheap shots. I’d rather not partake in the first place than experience that again.
I don’t have anything to wipe my mouth with. Priest opens the glove compartment, moves stuff around, and takes out a cloth, which he hands to me.
I notice then that the gloves he wears are camo too, and don’t cover the ends of his fingers.
Camo suits him better than Priest, I think.
My father wouldn’t do that, right?
I turn to Priest. “How well do you know my father?” I wipe my mouth and sit back, gulping in the fresh air.
“Not well at all.”
I frown. “So how did you get this job?”
“It’s simple. I work for a firm who are the best in close protection and this kind of situation, and your father hired us.”
“Do you know my father isn’t entirely legal in what he does?”
“Yes.”
No lies, no evasions, just the simple truth. I like that. It’s refreshing. My father lies to me. All the time. I know he does. He says it’s to keep me safe, and I’ve allowed it because he’s the only living relative I have left in this world, and I’m not ready to be an orphan quite yet.
“Does he do what Red said?”
